As soon as the car skidded its brakes beside us my brain went into overdrive: I feared Pav would be taken away for a full-on question-and-answer session. In an instant he might’ve been snatched and I’d never set eyes on him again. Pav would equal past tense.
I wasn’t sure if the dark curfew was still in force or not. All sense of Little Town rules had been muddied after the bombs came. It wasn’t dark yet, but it was getting there. Creeping in. It felt eerie being outside, knowing Old Country troops were lurking with their guns. Knowing the Regime’s Rascals could pounce from the shadows at any time. Even though the Old Country troops and the Regime appeared to be coexisting in some bizarre peaceful hostility you could feel the pressure on the streets; it hugged your body and kissed your face. The tiniest act of aggression from any Rascal thug could result in a blaze of bullets. Occasionally we’d heard them whizzing far in the distance.
This wasn’t an Old Country car, oh no; this was a manky Little Town Rascal vehicle. It rattled and crunched along, trying to blend in with the rest of the motors, which were just as shabby and tired. The few cars that were on the road drove with extra caution, each one attempting to draw zero attention from Old Country patrols. The last thing any driver wanted was to be smithereened.
The car that stopped next to us was a shambles. A metal tramp on wheels. A tinker with electric windows. The window slid down.
‘How are you homos?’ the man said, leaning out. It was the same window man who took us to see The Big Man that first time, just before the bombs rained down on us. A crappier vehicle, but the same dude.
Pav twisted his head away.
‘It’s OK, Pav. It’s not Old Country,’ I said. ‘Really, it’s OK.’
Pav twirled to face the window man.
‘Duda, right?’ the window man said.
‘Pavel Duda, yes.’
‘Old Country boy, eh?’
‘He hates Old Country,’ I said.
‘Was I asking you, Law?’ I said nothing. ‘Was I?’ I shook my head.
‘I hate man from Old Country,’ Pav said, nodding his head up in the air. The window man laughed. ‘I hate. Is true, Charlie?’ Pav looked for support.
‘It’s true, he does hate them,’ I said.
The window man continued with his smiley face.
‘Don’t we all, Duda. Don’t we all.’
‘They pure bad,’ Pav said.
‘It’s true, that’s what he thinks of them,’ I said.
‘Old Country bastard.’ Pav gobbed a massive spit on the pavement. This wasn’t anger for show. This was legit. The window man looked at me.
‘Old Country bastards.’ I gobbed a spit of my own that didn’t get past my chin. Rubbish! I wasn’t much of a spitter.
‘I no like. Go back,’ Pav said, again nodding his head to the sky.
The window man looked confused.
‘He means that he thinks Old Country troops should go home, not you,’ I explained.
‘Sure that’s what he thinks?’ the window man said to me.
‘It is. Hundred per cent true,’ I said.
‘Is that what you think, Duda?’ the window man asked.
‘Yes. I think,’ Pav said.
‘Well, you can think what you want, Duda, but you can’t escape from where you’re from, or who you are, can you now?’ the window man said.
That sounds familiar.
His smiley face was no more.
‘He’s not living in Old Country any more,’ I said.
‘That doesn’t matter, Law. He’s still one of them.’
‘He doesn’t feel like one of them,’ I said.
‘As I said, you can’t escape where you’re from.’ He pointed his gloved finger at me.
‘But he’s from here now. He lives in Little Town. Therefore he’s from Little Town,’ I said, wiping gob away from my chin and mouth.
‘I from Little Town,’ Pav said.
‘It’s true. He is,’ I said.
The window man leaned out a little further; it was his turn to sniff up and gob on to the pavement. Missed our shoes by inches. Your typical Little Town Rascal. It was clear that the presence of Old Country troops had burst these thugs’ bubble, which probably sent them into a wind tunnel of rage. They had no one left to bully. No one left to flex their muscles at. No one left to bug. Apart from easy targets like Pav and me.
‘Very big true,’ Pav said.
‘Here’s the thing, Duda. I don’t think it is true,’ the window man said. ‘I think you could be a dirty little spy.’
‘Never spy man,’ Pav said. ‘I no dirty little spy.’
‘You watch your tongue when you speak to me, Duda,’ the window man said, glove pointed at Pav.
‘We haven’t done anything,’ I said.
‘That’s what you think, Law. That’s what you think.’ Then it struck me: he must have been talking about the apples. Of course, he was talking about the apples, what else could he have been talking about? We (I) hadn’t done anything else to stray from the system. Before the bombs you might get a slap around the chops, but now you could get a bazooka up your arse.
‘What we have done?’ Pav asked.
‘We haven’t done a thing, and it’s not dark,’ I said, glaring at the window man.
‘In the back.’ He thumbed towards the back seat.
‘Why?’ Pav said.
‘He wants to know why,’ the window man said to nobody.
‘Yes, why?’ I said.
‘Now he wants to know why. Get a load of these two cheeky little …’
‘Where we go? You tell where we go?’ Pav was standing with his arms folded, face scowling.
A grin cut across my mouth. I was thinking, On you go, buddy. Get in there, pal. Stand your ground. Be all defiant and brilliant. I could have thrown my arms around his skinny neck and hugged him tight.
The window guy was hopping with rage. One second his eyes were glued on us, then they flicked to the rear-view mirror. His eyes see-sawed like that. He was clearly scared shitless in case Old Country patrol clocked him talking to us. Terrified in case Old Country patrol exposed him as nothing more than a Little Town Rascal, doing The Regime’s dirty work for them. Petrified in case it was his time to be q and a’ed in a dark and disused warehouse somewhere. His flicking eyes uncovered his fears.
‘Look, just get in, lads. There’s someone who wants to see the two of you.’
‘Is it The Big Man again?’ I asked.
‘He has chair?’ Pav said.
‘Of course he has chairs. What are you on about, Duda?’
‘No, he doesn’t mean that. He means, does he have our stuff?’ I asked.
‘Look, he wants to see you, that’s all I know. Now don’t make me get out of this vehicle, Law.’
‘I’ve heard that one before,’ I said.
Eyes still jammed to the rear-view, a bead of sweat on his brow. ‘You’ve got three seconds, then I’m out of here. And if that happens The Big Man will come and get you himself, which will make him severely pissed off. Is that what you want?’
We didn’t answer. I looked at Pav and raised my eyebrow. Pav shrugged his two twiggy shoulders.
‘He’s not a man to be messed with, lads.’ Rear-view eyes properly bricking it. ‘It’s up to you.’
‘We’d better get in, Pav,’ I said.
Pav went first.
*
This location was different from where we’d first met The Big Man. I suppose that factory, or wherever, didn’t make it past the bombs. Instead we pulled up outside a normal block not too far from ours. Nothing suspicious about it. Ingenious. The window man told us to go up two flights of stairs. Once there, someone would be waiting to take us to The Big Man. We hopped out of the vehicle and watched as it huffed away. We were alone. My bones started rattling.
I led Pav into the block. Fire and waste still polluted the air. It hurt your tongue. Slowly we went up the first flight of stairs. Then the second. On to the landing. An empty land-ing. We stood still. Rooted in fear. I held my breath. Tensed my stomach. Pav edged closer. I felt his scrawniness on me. Our scrawniness together. A door clinked down a corridor. Then another, closer, heavier. Boots sounded, closer, heavier. Something appeared: The Big Man?
No.
No, standing before us was a mega-muscled colossus of a man. He eyeballed us from top to bottom, snorting loudly through his nose. The crack of his bones echoed around the landing as he stretched out his back.
‘What are you pair of bawbags doing here?’
Quite possibly this was the biggest man I’d ever seen in my life. A human mountain. Pav let out a tiny whimper. I put my arm on his and squeezed.
‘Eh?’ Muscles said.
I gulped.
‘Erm … the guy who … erm, dropped us off said that … erm, The Big Man wanted to see us.’
‘That he does,’ Muscles said. ‘That he does.’
‘Where is he?’ I asked.
‘Through that door.’ Muscles pointed to a door down the landing.
When he stepped out of the way and opened his arm like a matador would to a couple of crazed bulls, his jacket flapped open. I spied a gun in an underarm holster. A flash of steel.
My face ticked.
‘Do we just go in?’ I said.
‘Be my guest,’ Muscles said.
If they were giving out nappies for fourteen-year-olds then I’d have been at the front of the queue. I opened the door and baby-stepped inside the flat. Pav behind me, the leader. A long hallway awaited. Carpet on the floor. Everything dark.
‘Charlie?’ Pav whispered.
‘What?’ I whispered back.
‘What is bawbag?’
‘Eejit. Or idiot,’ I said. ‘Keep close, Pav. Keep close.’ Bit by bit we made our way to the door at the end of the hall. Behind which The Big Man would be, wouldn’t he? Sat in a gold throne or something.
‘You have many word for stupid people in Little Town, Charlie.’
‘That’s because Little Town is full of them, Pav.’
A crash course in synonyms could be just what the doctor ordered.
I knocked twice on the door.
Two dinky knocks.
‘Come in!’ a voice boomed.